FOGS is delighted to announce that this year there will be a 5 station Teddy Bears' Picnic event on Saturday 6th July. This year for the first time 5 adjoining stations and friends' groups on the Glossop Line will be involved Broadbottom, Dinting, Glossop, Hadfield and Hattersley. Following the success of previous events it has been decided that this joint occasion will take place with, of course, the ongoing support of Northern Rail. Also different this year will be the inclusion of the Rainbow Trust Children's Charity - supporting families with children who have life threatening or terminal illnesses. Paul Marsh is local ambassador for the charity and he hopes that the event can be used to raise the charity's profile. We are delighted to help! The planning meeting between the 5 stations is to take place next month - May - and after this more details about the event will be announced.

Sir William McAlpine Chairman of The Railway Heritage Trust is to visit Glossop Station on Monday 22nd April. FOGS and Northern are to unveil a new poster board which will feature displays of recent awards. Sir William is to be the guest of honour for the event which will take place between 12.00am and 1.00pm. The idea behind the event is to create a permanent home for the certificates/photos so that they can be shared by everyone using the station. FOGS also hope to use the occasion as a thank you to people who have helped bring about improvements to the station eg Pat at Decor8, Les and Jean for their kind provision of plants, Rosie at Glossop Garden Cente for the Christmas trees.....we will be in touch with invitations! Also attending will be Mark Barker, Client and Stakeholder Manager for Northern in his final week of work before he retires. He has been a constant friend and a source of support to FOGS over the years. John Yellowlees, ScotRail's External Relations Manager, also hopes to be there. John recently invited Neil to attend the ScotRail Station Adopters lunch in Glasgow - a kind gesture. It was a very interesting event and helped cement further station friendships. Bunty and Jacqueline are kindly going to arrange in house refreshments for the April event. In the meantime preparations continue behind the scenes for the poster board involving lots of blue material being sewn by Lesley and photos being marshalled/ organisedby Chris Strogen and Paul Marsh. The poster board, generously donated by Seve Magner atTfGM is now residing in Theo's office at Guide Bridge ready for component assembly!!